three lobed recordings:
catalog/ordering

TLR 083:
gunn - truscinski duo
— sand city
LP + download

LP released november
2, 2010 in a limited
edition of 624 copies. out of print.

available as a digital download
from
(click logo for direct link).

three lobed recordings is
extremely excited to be releasing sand
city, a blistering new
collection of original compositions
from steve gunn and john truscinski, otherwise known as the
gunn-truscinski duo. steve gunn is one of the most exciting american
guitarists working today. his solo discography, as well as his work
with GHQ, should be well known to folks who have followed three lobed
recordings over the past several years. percussionist john truscinski
is a stalwart of the american underground in his own right through his
dedicated work in x.o.4 (with bill nace and jake meginsky),
slaughterhouse percussion, as well as with GHQ (as last seen on the
outfit’s everywhere
at once
from the oscillation
III
series). sand city
is an
extremely mature and thoughtfully crafted album that conjures some of
the most potent moments of both fantasias-era
sandy
bull and the more guitar-centric sun city girls albums while firmly
charting its own raga-based territory. it is an exceptionally strong
collection that should leave listeners rapt for years to come.

while this is the first release
dedicated exclusively to their
collaborative works, gunn and truscinski have played together for over
six years. by working together both in public and private, the duo has
been able to develop an advanced personal musical language, allowing
each of the players to seamlessly intuit the other’s
improvised movements and playing shifts. sand
city
represents a collection of material that the duo has long been honing
within their brooklyn practice space as well as with an occasional
local show. three lobed recordings had been aware of the alchemy being
cooked up by the duo and sent gunn and truscinski to the confines of
jason meagher’s black dirt studios in westtown, new york, in
june of 2010 to record. sand
city is the fruit of
that labor. all of the material on the album was captured live in the
studio with no overdubs.

part of what makes sand
city so special
comes in how gunn and truscinski present the listener with glimpses of
everything that they are capable of as a duo. one fashion in which they
set out to accomplish this goal is to split the album into sides that
focus on the acoustic and electric side of their collaborations. the
album’s first side starts out with the mesmerizing
“taksim II” (for a downloadable preview, click here).
within this track, the players waste no time building towards a
pressing and urgent pace highlighted by gunn’s hyperactively
expressive fret-work and the burning roll of truscinski’s
steady and engrossing rhythmic backbeat. “b38
blues” follows the opening fury with a gentle guitar
exploration stylistically paired with the ghostly tones of bowed
cymbals. the track – including the guitar strumming and
bowing – gains speed as it moves along towards an otherwordly
climax. as magnificent as the first side is, it acts to set the stage
for the epic centerpiece, “wythe raag.” we are all
fortunate that the duo’s time at black dirt captured this
thirteen-minute opus of spiraling guitar figures, steadily rolling
toms, and scintillating cymbal play. it is haunting, beautiful and
engrossing. (fans of gunn’s who are familiar with his too
early for the hammer
album will have heard an earlier version of this same track recorded
under the name “wythe duet” within the
duo’s practice space.)

sand
city is from a hand-numbered
edition
of 624 copies and is pressed on 140 gram dutch vinyl by record industry
and housed within a handsome silkscreened jacket bearing new
photographic artwork from anjali bhojani. the album will be accompanied
by a download coupon for drm-free mp3s of the album. sand
city
was mastered by patrick klem.